Intel Corporation (INTC) To Make Ivy Bridge Chip More Efficient

Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC) is reportedly working on the efficiency of its Core processors. CNET reports that the company plans to decrease power consumption on its Ivy Bridge processors, which power most Macs and PCs.

Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC) was apparently already planning to reduce power consumption greatly in its Haswell processors, which are slated to be the company’s next generation of processors. The company has already released some details of its Haswell processors, which are expected to reduce power consumption to 10 watts. An official release date for those processors has not yet been given, although leaked information purports that the release date will be sometime in the middle of next year. That means if Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC) does succeed in making its Ivy Bridge chips run on less power, then that would likely take place before the release of the Haswell model.

Current Ivy Bridge processors are rated at 17 watts. If Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC) is able to cut the power consumption of these chips drastically, they could become suitable for tablets. In fact, some industry analysts speculate that if the power consumption of the Ivy Bridge processor is reduced far enough, it could pave the way for more computers that can be both a tablet and a laptop.

As Mashable points out, current processor options for tablet makers all have their flaws. The choices include a bulky Intel Core or AMD processor, which takes away from the slim profile of the tablet; an Intel Atom chip, which does not perform as well as a Core chip, but uses less power; or a processor designed by ARM, which doesn’t require much power to run, but is not enabled for apps which run on some past versions of Windows.